


100 Bad Days

by Redbone135



Category: Borderlands (Video Games)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-29
Updated: 2020-01-29
Packaged: 2021-02-25 15:07:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,395
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22458187
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Redbone135/pseuds/Redbone135
Summary: A short drabble/free write about Brick's insecurities in the early days of vault hunting. Very minor morbrick at the end.
Relationships: Brick/Mordecai (Borderlands)
Comments: 4
Kudos: 25





	100 Bad Days

**Author's Note:**

> The beasties celebrated 100 days today- so insanely proud of them and all they’ve accomplished. Anyways, we ended our day of 100-themed activities with a twenty-minute free write and somehow I ended up with this.

**100 Bad Days**

_ 100 bad days made 100 good stories. 100 good stories make me interesting at parties. -AJR _

“-And that’s when they asked if I'd like to see the warrant,” Mordecai laughed, throwing back the rest of his drink and adding the empty bottle to the tower that the four vault hunters were building around the grimy little table at the back of the New Haven bar. “So there I am, twelve years old, and I think they’re there about the bird, right, cause it’s supposed to be a pet-free apartment. So I summoned up all four feet of courage my little preteen body had and inspect the piece of paper they’ve handed me like I’ve been to law school. I’m just looking for bird-related words, cierto? But I’m twelve and it’s a warrant, so it turns into just looking for words I recognize pretty damn quickly. I’m like, 'The fuck does it say battery for, birds don’t have batteries!'”

Roland and Lilith roared with laughter and liquor, cheeks rosy in the dim light of the flickering generator, hands resting awkwardly on each other’s knees. 

“So what happened?” Roland prodded, draining the rest of his bottle and adding it to the tower under skeptical supervision of the others. He had a steady hand with a trigger, but he was what Lilith called a lightweight and Brick’s mother would have called a cheap drunk. 

“Yeah, Mordy, I’m dying to know- did you get to keep the bird?” Lilith added, peeling the label off the edge of her bottle, her eyes darting back and forth between the cocky sniper and her shy soldier. Lilith was what Brick’s mother would have called a cheap date.

Brick didn’t know why it bothered him so much, after all, it wasn’t like he had much of a chance with the masked man who had caught his attention the moment he boarded the bus last week. Mordecai was a glowing beacon of laughter and light- he captured the hearts and eyes of most people they met with his charming stories and boyish laugh. No, Brick didn’t have a chance with a man like that, but it was greedy of Lilith to want both. Yeah, that was it, that was what was eating him up.

Not the overwhelming feeling that he didn’t belong here. Like he was hanging over the group like a ginormous thundercloud, all scowls and grunted syllables, the threat of lightning and thunderous ire. No, it wasn’t the desire to go back home, apologize to his parents, and live the rest of his life on Menoetius trying to be something he knew he couldn’t. He hadn’t felt like he belonged there- a big fish in a little pond his mom used to say- but he didn’t feel like he fit in much better here. The truth of the matter was, for every word Mordecai had spoken to the group, Brick had choked back ten. He wasn’t slow like they all seemed to think; he was shy, and scared, and overwhelmed at the impossible amounts of charisma shoved into the three beautiful people who had for some reason adopted him like a lost puppy. 

No, it was definitely the way Lilith let her hand linger on Roland’s thighs while her eyes and laughter captivated Mordecai. It was Lilith- that was what was bothering him, he lied to himself.

Uh-oh. 

They were all staring at him. Had he accidentally said something out loud? Did they expect him to say something? He chuckled, nervously, hoping that would sate their stares, but his hopes were hollow. 

“I’m telling you, I don't think he understands English,” Lilith whispered with false empathy, earning her a hateful glare from Mordecai and a knowing nod from Roland. 

“Hey, big guy, cervezas, por favor?” Mordecai asked, his tone conveying more meaning than his words. In less than ten syllables he managed to communicate two things: he knew Brick wasn’t dumb and he was no stranger to being misjudged himself. “It’s your turn.”

Right. They had all agreed to buy a couple rounds tonight. He had almost forgotten, it felt like they had been here for hours, running on the adrenaline from today’s fight and the leftover nerves humming anxiously about the worries of tomorrow. 

Without a word to the group, Brick stood and made his way over to the bar, dodging ceiling fans and the bare light bulbs that hung dangerously close to his head. He opted to stand when he reached the bar- the little stools were too small for him anyways. Maybe he’d feel like he fit in a lot more if he actually physically fit in anywhere.

“Another round?” the bartender asked and Brick nodded, sliding his change across the bar even though he hadn’t finished the first one Lilith bought him, much less the second round that Roland had covered. He had noticed that Mordecai had not brought him a third, though he didn’t think the others had.

He watched the group continue to laugh in his absence, sharing stories of bravery and triumph and more than anything he wished he had a story to share too. But he didn’t have good stories. He could tell about the scar on his wrist, but he doubted the group would be much impressed by the chicken that had objected to having her eggs stolen. He could tell about the one on his lip- but they were having fun and more than anything that story just tended to ruin the mood. He only seemed to have stories of mundanity and victim-hood. Even in this last week he hadn’t amassed but a few heroic stories and they had all borne witness to those moments anyways. 

Balancing the tray in one palm, he weaved his way back through the crowd, handing out drinks to the other three vault hunters: Mordecai whispered 'gracias', Roland nodded a thank you, and Lilith continued right on with her story as if the beer had just magically appeared in her hand.

Bless her heart, Brick thought, she probably didn’t even realize just how abrasive she was. Young and attractive, Lilith told stories with the same zeal as Mordecai, but they always fell just a little bit short. Her punchlines never hit as hard, the substance just wasn’t as filling. But God love her, she didn’t seem to notice.

They were laughing now. Would it be weirder to abstain or to join? Desperate to feel like part of the group he let out a hearty laugh, a little too loud- he was always just a little too loud, and the others turned to stare.

“That reminds me of a similar situation I found myself in on one of the Edans," Mordecai interrupted, drawing attention mercifully away from Brick, "It was a classic case of a bounty gone bad: see my hunting partner said we should- eh, that’s not important. Anyways, like in Lilith’s story I end up looking down the barrel of a pretty expensive Maliwan, and I just remember thinking- Why wouldn’t this be the moment I die? I thought, Mordecai, you arrogant bastard, some people don’t get thirty years, why did you think you’d be one of the lucky ones?  But I’ve never been much of a quitter, and I’m not as persuasive as Lilith, so I did what any man would have done.” 

Here Mordecai paused to invite speculation, two drunks and Brick eagerly hanging on his every word. "Anyone care to take a guess?"

"Did you grab the gun out of his hand?" Brick ventured, earning a laugh and a wink from Mordecai. 

“Ok, well, any man but you, buenote. I did what felt natural to my scrawny cowardly ass. I offered him ten bucks and a skin mag to put the gun down.”

“Did it work?” Roland asked amazed.

“No, but the crying sure did,” Mordecai laughed. “He said he wasn’t about to kill a grown man without enough dignity to die with a dry eye. But hey, you know what they say: Ante el amor y la muerte, el coraje es inútil.”

Brick didn’t speak a word of Spanish, but that sure did sound beautiful to him. 

“What about you, Juggernaut, got any good near-death stories?”

Brick didn’t like the way they all turned to stare at him, catching him mid-gawk at Mordecai’s smile. He gave a curt shake of his head, eyes wide with panic. What did they expect him to say? He couldn’t pull something funny from his history if money had been on the line. Instead he stood up, wobbling outside.

“Probably too drunk to think straight,” he heard Roland announce as he left, Lilith agreeing wholeheartedly. But Mordecai knew better.

*

It felt like hours he sat curled up in the cold evening air, knees to his chest, scalding tears streaming down his face. You wouldn't expect such a hot planet like Pandora to get so cold in the evening, but the dry heat of the day gave way to the crisp chill of the night almost too suddenly to bare. It had been scorching when they entered the bar, but now Brick sat, hugging his knees and shivering as his tears cooled on his cheeks.

There was nothing like the bittersweet feeling of missing a home you never wanted to go back to. Nothing like the embarrassment of waiting for the closest thing you had to friends to finish having fun so you could all go back to your hotel together. Because the other option was to leave them, and even separated from them by the thick wall of the bar, Brick knew that his destiny waited inside. He wasn’t brave like them, or funny, or smart. But he was damn determined to be a part of the team. Because his friends were already the best thing about him. 

The door creaked open and Mordecai made his way out, hips swaying with intoxication as he propped himself up against the wall opposite Brick and tugged at his zipper.

Great. Just how he’d wanted this night to end. Not only in tears, but inconsolably so in front of the stupid asshole he’d had the misfortune of harboring a crush on. Maybe the sniper hadn’t seen him, too drunk, too focused on relieving himself. Please God let the sniper have not seen him.

“Que te pica?” Mordecai called over his shoulder. Brick hoped the dark goggles in the man’s mask were enough to obscure him in this dim light, but who was he kidding, it would take a house to obscure Brick.

“I don’t speak Spanish,” Brick mumbled.

“Yeah, but you’re also not an idiot, so figure it out,” Mordecai said, hopping up and down for a moment while tugging his zipper back up. 

No one had ever talked to Brick that way- the directness, an upfront respect, was a little refreshing. He wiped a paw across his face, looking up at the skinny little man who had composed himself and was now making his way across the alley to loom over Brick. He sort of liked the way the Hunter took up his entire field of vision. 

“I don’t know what I was thinking coming here,” Brick confessed, “I’m not a vault hunter like y'all. I don't have any good stories, all mine end in tears and hurt feelings. You’re all a bunch of badasses, and I'm just out here crying in the alley.”

“You want to know what the warrant was for?” Mordecai asked.

“Huh?”

“Idiota! That story I was telling a couple beers ago. The cops came to my door, with a warrant? It wasn’t for the damn bird I smuggled in. My dad had put my mom in the ICU, they were there to arrest him. I spent two weeks looking after my younger siblings while we took bets on what would be shorter- mom’s hospital stay or dad’s jail time. And the near death story- the guy that put the gun in my face- he wasn’t a bounty gone bad, he was an ex of mine- an old hunting partner, I left out that part. I don’t have good stories, amigo, I have bad days that I've learned to laugh at. Because if you aren't laughing, you’re crying. And I’d rather be laughing. How about you?”

Brick felt his cheeks color further, his choice obvious in the wet spots on his t-shirt. “You make it look so easy. You all do. But also you, in particular.”

Mordecai laughed,“Si, that’s cause I’ve got the most practice. A good story is just a horrible experience with a positive spin. It’s all about the way you tell it- perspective, entiendes? Make it a joke and then people laugh with you.”

“I’m more used to them laughing at me.”

“Por que?”

“Does that mean ‘why’?”

Mordecai frowned in response and Brick imagined he was wrinkling his nose under his mask.

‘Why not?’ seemed like a better question, but Brick attempted to answer it anyways. “Because I look like a monster but act like a baby.”

“Better than looking like a baby and acting like a monster, cierto?”

Brick chuckled, a little hiccup of a laugh that was still entirely too loud for polite conversation. 

“See, we’ll make a vault hunter out of you yet. Anyways, you can't leave- then I'd have nothing good to look at- being the sniper gets boring some times and your ass looks good in those jeans."

Brick couldn't quite believe what he was hearing. Could he be so lucky? "Are you kidding?"

"No, I've been flirting with you all night, meathead. Maybe you are as dumb as you look. You ready to head back in?”

Brick shook his head. His face still felt hot and though he wasn’t ashamed at all any more that Mordecai had seen him cry he couldn’t bare the others knowing. “Can you tell me another story? A good one?”

He liked the way a grin crept across Mordecai’s masked features, spreading slowly like a sunrise from ear to ear. “Want to hear the story about how I banged a vault hunter in New Haven?”

Brick furrowed his brow confused. He nodded slowly.

“Too bad,” Mordecai laughed, placing his hand on Brick’s bicep as he helped the larger man up, “Hasn’t happened yet. But I’m pretty confident it’s going to be one hell of a story.”


End file.
